The present invention relates to a content management device and a content management method.
In corporate organizations, content management devices are used as countermeasures against leakage of information to carry out administration in which access control information for electronic documents and other contents is centrally managed in folder units.
However, there continues to be a large number of serious problems involving the leakage of contents containing customer information and other confidential information. Therefore, there has been increasing use in recent years of administration in which access control information is embedded in the content itself targeted for management in addition to access control information in folder units (refer to, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2003-91448 and Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2008-46784).
However, when access control in file units is combined with the use of access control in content units, there is the possibility of inconsistencies occurring between both forms of access control information, thereby resulting in the risk of decreased convenience and increased administrative costs.
For example, even if a user has access rights to folder where content is stored, if access rights to the content itself not assigned to that user, the fact that the use has not been assigned access rights cannot be detected until the content is opened, thereby resulting in a lack of user convenience.
In addition, the situation may also arise in which, even though access rights to the content itself may have been granted, if a user does not have access rights to the folder where the content is stored, the content cannot be accessed.
In this manner, there is the risk of unforeseen leakage of information in situations in which there is an absence of consistency between access control information for folders where content is stored and access control information for the content itself.
Thus, in the case of combining the use of access control in folder units and access control in content units, it is necessary to develop measures such as investigating the consistency between access control information for folders where content is stored and access control information for the content itself, and changing access control information in the absence of consistency as necessary.
For example, in the document management system disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2003-91448, access rights can be set collectively after having selected a plurality of documents or folders. In addition, at this time, access rights for security levels below the selected folder can also be changed. However, in the case of this type of configuration, although access rights of selected files or folders can be changed collectively, it is not possible to confirm the consistency status between access rights to folders and access rights to documents within those folders, thereby making it difficult to precisely manage access rights.
In addition, in the document management device disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2008-46784, as a result of carrying out an interlinked operation setting for a plurality of documents, when an access right to a certain document has been changed, the access rights of other documents are also changed in coordination therewith. However, in this type of configuration, it is necessary to carry out an interlinked operation setting, thereby making management of access control complex.
In particular, in the case of managing access rights in folder units and access rights in content unit using respectively different devices, it is not easy to manage both types of access rights while maintaining consistency there between.